Habitual unfaithful husband, Jack Freeman begins flirting with the Effie McKenzie, and so breaks up her marriage. Blanche Gordon, a friend of Jack's wife Louise, then comes to see Jack several times in order to plead with him to give up extramarital affairs and accept the responsibilities that go with being a husband.

Novice businessman Curtis Jadwin is introduced to the world of grain speculation by veteran broker Charles Cressler. At a performance of Faust, Curtis meets and falls in love with Laura Dearborn, the sweetheart of artist Sheldon Corthell. Curtis pursues Laura and finally convinces her to marry him, but soon after their wedding, he neglects her for his business. In her loneliness, Laura renews her relationship with Sheldon and the lovers plan to elope. When Curtis is ruined on the market, however, Laura rejects her lover and comforts her husband.

Ludwig "Old Dutch" Streusand and his daughter Violet live in New York, and after years of hard study and labor Old Dutch completes his invention: the "teloptophone," a device which, when attached to a telephone, enables the speaker to see the party at the other end of the wire.

Ted Vandeveer, a lawyer without clients, receives notice that he has been included in his rich uncle's will, he and his partner, James Sweeney, are excited, then they find that Ted's cousin Archie inherited nearly everything. With the $700 left after paying their creditors, Ted and James go to a fashionable resort, where the hotel clerk mistakenly puts them in the exclusive suite reserved for Archie. Passing for a wealthy man, Ted attracts many eligible girls, among them Mildred Niles, the daughter of a wealthy broker.

Mimi, an orphan, is taken in by a drunken innkeeper and becomes a domestic. She meets Rudolphe, scion of a well-to-do family, who rescues her from the unwanted advances of a drunken hotel guest. They fall madly in love, but Rudolphe's uncle, M. Durandin, wants Rudolphe to marry a family friend, Madame de Rouvre, and writes Mimi a letter, telling her that she is ruining Rudolphe's life. Musette and Marcel, friends of Mimi, also try to break up the romance by introducing Mimi to other men, and Rudolphe becomes jealous and leaves her. Brokenhearted, Mimi declines in health and eventually throws herself into the river but is rescued and taken to the hospital. Realizing it is only a matter of time before she dies, she drags herself back to the room where she and Rudolphe were happiest. Rudolphe is there and she dies knowing that he loves her.

Harry Horton, a spoiled son of a bookie, is prone to gambling and allows a weak character to influence him. His beloved father looks upon his son's character with more pity than anger in his heart. Harry mingles with a crowd of gamblers and loses money. Finally, in a big game, he loses every cent, and when he draws a check the bank tells him that there are no funds.

Donald Gray is accused by his partner of dishonesty. The shock of the accusation kills him, and since his innocence cannot be proven, his daughter takes it upon herself to avenge the insult. Meeting Alan Burnham, the couple's only child, he decides to ruin his career.

Betty Brown is an egregious coquette and flirt. She fools a pair of lovers, and her indecision lands her in a pretty mess at a Hartford hotel, where she is cajoled into passing herself off as the wife of a man whose real wife is on her way to meet him. Betty just butts into a sea of trouble, for the man and his wife are to receive some money from the former's uncle on condition that the wife meets with his approval. The general mix-up at the hotel caused by the meeting there of all these opposing interests is the cause of a great deal of fun and confusion, the central figure of which is always Little Miss Betty Brown.

A restless young girl yearns to leave her rural environment and "get away from it all". One day she stumbles upon a film crew shooting a western near her home. She makes friends with the film's leading man, who encourages her to try her luck as an actress. So she leaves her small town and goes to the big city to break into the picture business. However, things don't turn out quite the way she planned.

The hypnotic Svengali controls the singing voice of a young starlet, but he cannot control her heart.

Margaret Sherwood's fiancé has disappeared in the Arctic and she hasn't heard from him in two years. Yet she does not believe he died. Price Latham, in love with Margaret, offers to organize a new expedition to prove otherwise. In return, she promises to marry Latham, come what may.

The spread of yellow journalism in a small town almost destroys the lives of several people and threatens the livelihood of the hamlet itself.

Mountain girl Plutina lives with her grandfather, refuses to marry moonshiner Dan Hodges, preferring instead Zeke, a young farmer. When Zeke learns that Dan, in revenge, shot Plutina's pet trained bear, Zeke vows to kill him. After a revenue officer, shot by Dan, is cared for by Zeke's mother, Dan vows to kill Zeke. Dan and Zeke fight, and although Dan is beaten, he escapes into the mountains. Sometime later, the revenue officer secures for Zeke the position of overseer of government timber lands. As Zeke waits for a train after missing the first one, he learns that Dan, who has threatened to kill Plutina's grandfather and sister and set fire to their house unless Plutina marries him, has abducted her. Zeke arrives at a hidden cave where Dan has taken Plutina just as she is about to jump from a cliff. The ensuing brawl ends when Dan is plunged over the cliff. Finally, Zeke and Plutina marry.

The old gardener, attracted by the ducks' antics, goes to the lake to find a basket with a baby in it. He becomes her guardian but passes away when she is fourteen, leaving her the house and garden. Beloved by the woodsman Jean, one day Lionel, a famous painter, approaches her to be his model, and she accepts. Eventually she finds herself torn between the two men.

A poor but brilliant inventor sets out to make his fortune by discovering buried treasure, with the aid of a special inverted periscope through which he can view the ocean floor.

In the Blue Ridge Mountains Postmaster's daughter Sally Haston loves Steve Carey, but wants him to enlist and fight the Germans during the Great War. Steve is unhappy at the training camp Steve argues with his roughneck tentmate Billy Murphy. When Steve deserts to visit Sally she takes him back to the camp, where Captain Roderick Brooke sympathetically explains the purpose of the war. Later, moonshiner James Grogan holes up with a gun to escape the draft and holds Sally prisoner. Her father organizes a posse, but Steve, home on leave, rescues her and announces that he is leaving for Europe to fight for democracy.

Jones is a traveling salesman -- or drummer, as they were known in those days -- who peddles Bibles and playing cards at a discount. Along with Professor Goodly, he goes to a prize fight which is raided by the police. The two men wind up at a boarding school for young ladies where Jones is mistaken for the Bishop of Timbuctoo.

Ruined by Charles Wainwright, George Garrison commits suicide but begs his son Henry to avenge him before expiring. Henry goes West makes a fortune, then returns to New York. Assuming the name of Henry Thompson he becomes Wainwright's protégé and through his machinations is elected mayor of New York. For his support Wainwright wants a franchise binding the city to the financier's railway, but Henry refuses. Attempting to frame Henry on an old murder charge fails when the “victim,” Henry's partner Joe Standing shows up. Finally, Henry confronts Wainwright exposing his evil deeds. Wainwright’s daughter, Dallas, proclaims her love for Henry.

According to Richard Standhope's will, both his daughter Laura and her long-lost twin brother Larry must be reunited by a certain date, or the estate will revert to her avaricious guardian, Andrew Brean. Following Standhope's death, Laura and her sweetheart, Jim Watson, read in her deceased mother's diary that Andrew had broken up the Standhopes' marriage soon after the twins' birth by unjustly accusing Mrs. Standhope of infidelity. Laura was then sent to boarding school, while little Larry, placed in his father's care, was neglected and later became a thief. As Laura and Jim ponder Larry's whereabouts, the house is robbed by none other than Larry, now called "the Kid," and his cohort, "the Snail."

Ragna "Rags" Jansen has found local success and acclaim in her small town as an actress, but dreams of stardom on Broadway.